Harder Than Gun Control: People Control

By Josh Barro -
Dec 28, 2012

Byron York has a column today about gun owners' reaction to gun-control
proposals. His takeaway: Certain restrictions on so-called assault weapons are
politically viable but won't have much impact on violent crime. He closes with
this thought:

In the end, fixing the problem will have to
involve dealing more decisively with crazy people like the Newtown shooter, as
well as other mass killers. And that will require entirely different measures
than regulating guns.

Along similar lines, in his bizarre speech last week, National Rifle
Association Chief Executive Officer Wayne LaPierre called for "an active
national database of the mentally ill."

What exactly would it mean to "deal more decisively" with people like Adam
Lanza? What would the federal government do with a "database of the mentally
ill"? And since more than half of Americans experience mental illness during
their lifetimes, who would be on it?

Any policy that focuses on the mentally ill to reduce crime seems likely to
fall into one of two categories: minimally effective or totalitarian.

At the totalitarian end, you could try to identify and forcibly treat (or
commit) potentially dangerous people before they act. The problem is that the
vast majority of the people this approach would impact would never have
committed crimes of violence.

Or you could take steps that respect the autonomy of the individual. These
might include efforts to make mental health care more affordable and less
stigmatized, without forcing the unwilling into treatment.

But such policies wouldn't be "decisive," and they wouldn't have impacted
Lanza, who came from a wealthy family that could easily afford treatment. And
tracking the mentally ill and treating them like potential criminals might
discourage people from seeking treatment.

There is also, of course, the matter that most violent crime is not driven by
mental illness.

I think York is right that an assault weapons ban similar to the now-lapsed
1994 ban would have little impact on violent crime. In order to meaningfully
reduce gun crime, we would have to make it difficult for most members of the
public to own handguns.

Maybe effective gun control like that is politically or logistically
impossible. But that doesn't mean an effort to "deal decisively" with people who
might commit violent crimes before they act -- you might call this "people
control" -- is viable.

It's easier to identify dangerous weapons than dangerous people, and
stripping someone of a firearm is a lesser violation of liberty than committing
someone. That's why "Minority Report" is just a movie, and it's why people-
control proposals are a distraction from policies that could actually save
lives.

(Josh Barro is lead writer for the Ticker. E-mail him and follow him on
Twitter.)